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"Wylie Williams" wrote:

My observation is that much of the high end advancement seems to have been
made by making changes that the best educated people say are not appreciable
improvements.

The "high-end" has never made an 'advancement' in sound quality. They merely
package current technology in different ways (sometimes grossly incompetent
ways) or simply make merchandising/marketing claims for it.

Ionce had a great debate with a person claimimg that the original MacIntosh
amplifier was proof that my statement that the audio industry in general and
the high-end in particular simply used communications industry trickle-down
technology was false. Inerestingly enough another poster noted that he still
owned one of the MacIntosh units referenced and that the interior of the
chassis still had a sticker that said "licensed from Western Electric" where
Frank MAcIntosh had previously worked.

Who can you trust to know what is better? Listeners or
engineer/scientists? Sometimes one is right, sometimes the other.

But this carries the assumption that engineers/scientists are not also
listeners.The dichotomy is patently false. Much of the seminal listening
evaluation of communications technology (which forms the platform for pro and
consumer audio, including the invention of 'stereo') was conducted at Bell Labs
in the 30s.

I
remember several McIntosh tube owners I knew who switched to the new
improved transistors. All the EEs said transistors were an advancement.
Now there are a few contrary opinions in that regard.

So why does modern day MacIntosh make solid state amplifiers these days?

As for the cable enhancer it isn't fair to judge a product because the
salesman failed to make his point.

This demonstration was claimed to have been conducted by the manufacturer.

Even the best products are sold by
incompetents or con men at times, but the pitch doesn't affect the product,
just your attitude.

Yes, but the pitch didn't make the case although naive subjects bought it. That
was the point. IF that product was able to change the sound of cables why
wasn't the experimental outcome more obvious? Why did it rely on the semi-open
easily-biased demonstration? Why didn't the company have a paper with published
results that could be replicated?

In an almost related context I recall reading that in
the early days electricity was thought to be a vapor in the air called
effluvium. Somehow they figured out how to store it in a "condenser". Now
the effluvium theory is discredited . However condensers (now called
capacitiors) work just the same as before, only with a new theory. The words
did not affect reality at all.
I just wish to share my experience; feel free to prefer your own opinion.

Wylie Williams

So you still believe a Cable Enhancer changes the sound of cables? Want to
prove that in a bias-controlled experiment? I'm assuming you still have a Cable
Enhancer. No?